Panna Aleksandra, to his great surprise, bore herself calmly enough while looking at the threatening precipice before her; only her face grew pale and became still more serious. Unbending resolution was reflected in her stern look.
“I shall be able to save myself,” said she, “so help me God and the holy cross!”
“The prince has not consented hitherto to follow Sakovich’s counsel,” added Kettling. “But when he sees that the road he has chosen leads to nothing—” and he began to tell the reasons which restrained Boguslav.
The lady listened with frowning brow, but not with superfluous attention, for she had already begun to ponder on means to wrest herself free of this terrible guardianship. But there was not a place in the whole country unsprinkled with blood, and plans of flight did not seem to her clear; hence she preferred not to speak of them.
“Cavalier,” said she at last, “answer me one question. Is Prince Boguslav on the side of the King of Sweden or the King of Poland?”
“It is a secret to none of us,” answered the young officer, “that the prince wishes the division of this Commonwealth, so as to make of Lithuania an independent principality for himself.”
Here Kettling was silent, and you would have thought that his mind was following involuntarily the thoughts of Olenka; for after a while he added—
“The elector and the Swedes are at the service of the prince; and since they will occupy the Commonwealth, there is no place in which to hide from him.”
Olenka made no answer.
The young man waited awhile longer, to learn if she would ask him other questions; but when she was silent, occupied with her own thoughts, he felt that it was not proper for him to interrupt her; therefore he bent double in a parting bow, sweeping the floor with the feathers in his cap.
“I thank you, cavalier,” said Olenka, extending her hand to him.
The officer, without turning, withdrew toward the door. All at once there appeared on her face a slight flush. She hesitated a moment, and then said—
“One word, cavalier.”
“Every word is for me a favor.”
“Did you know Pan Andrei Kmita?”
“I made his acquaintance, my lady, in Kyedani. I saw him the last time in Pilvishki, when we were marching hither from Podlyasye.”
“Is what the prince says true, that Pan Kmita offered to do violence to the person of the King of Poland?”
“I know not, my lady. It is known to me that they took counsel together in Pilvishki; then the prince went with Pan Kmita to the forest, and it was so long before he returned that Patterson was alarmed and sent troops to meet him. I led those troops. We met the prince. I saw that he was greatly changed, as if strong emotion had passed through his soul. He was talking to himself, which never happens to him. I heard how he said: ‘The devil would have undertaken that—’ I know nothing more. But later, when the prince mentioned what Kmita offered, I thought, ‘If this was it, it must be true.’ ”
Panna Billevich pressed her lips together.
“I thank you,” said she. And after a while she was alone.
The thought of flight mastered her thoroughly. She determined at any price to tear herself from those infamous places, and from the power of that treacherous prince. But where was she to find refuge? The villages and towns were in Swedish hands, the cloisters were ruined, the castles levelled with the earth; the whole country was swarming with soldiers, and with worse than soldiers—with fugitives from the army, robbers, all kinds of ruffians. What fate could be waiting for a maiden cast as a prey to that storm? Who would go with her? Her aunt Kulvyets, her uncle, and a few of his servants. Whose power would protect her? Kettling would go, perhaps; maybe a handful of faithful soldiers and friends might even be found who would accompany him. But as Kettling had fallen in love with her beyond question, then how was she to incur a debt of gratitude to him, which she would have to pay afterward with a great price? Finally, what right had she to close the career of that young man, scarcely more than a youth, and expose it to pursuit, to persecution, to ruin, if she could not offer him anything in return save friendship? Therefore, she asked herself, what was she to do, whither was she to flee, since here and there destruction threatened her, here and there disgrace?
In such a struggle of soul she began to pray ardently; and more especially did she repeat one prayer with earnestness to which the old colonel had constant recourse in evil times, beginning with the words—
“God saved Thee with Thy Infant
From the malice of Herod;
In Egypt he straightened the road
For Thy safe passage—”
At this moment a great whirlwind rose, and the trees in the garden began to make a tremendous noise. All at once the praying lady remembered the wilderness on the borders of which she had grown up from infancy; and the thought that in the wilderness she would find the only safe refuge flew through her head like lightning.
Then Olenka breathed deeply, for she had found at last what she had been seeking. To Zyelonka, to Rogovsk! There the enemy would not go, the ruffian would not seek booty. There a man of the place, if he forgot himself, might go astray and wander till death; what must it be to a stranger not knowing the road? There the Domasheviches, the Smoky Stakyans; and if they are gone, if they have followed Pan Volodyovski, it is possible to go by those forests far beyond and seek quiet in other wildernesses.
The remembrance of Pan Volodyovski rejoiced Olenka. Oh,
